Microsoft almost bought Sega before building Xbox itself

According to a former exec, Microsoft had strongly considered buying Sega before deciding to build the Xbox console by itself.

Joachim Kempin,the former vice president of Windows Sales at Microsoft, had this to say: "There were three companies at that point in time, I think this was [Sony,] Sega and Nintendo. There was always talk maybe we buy Sega or something like that; that never materialized. We were actually able to license them what they call Windows CE, the younger brother of Windows, to run on their system and make that their platform [for the Dreamcast]."

Kempin spent 20 years at the company, and says former CEO Bill Gates got into the hardware business just to stop Sony from dominating the market.

In regards to Sega, Kempin adds"[Gates] didn't think that Sega had enough muscle to eventually stop Sony so we did our own Xbox thing."

Sega sold 10.6 million Dreamcast in three years, compared to 24 million Xboxs sold before Microsoft released the Xbox 360.